Views From My Allotment: don't let the old in

Yes. But I didn’t languish on the Council’s waiting list for a year just to grow potatoes. Well, I am growing some, but my reasoning for an allotment was far less environmentally friendly. I wanted to escape from the pressure of work and the noise in the house. I dutifully trot down there with a spade, but I rarely use it, the deckchair sees far more action that the dirt.

An allotment is a little piece of the city where life stops, it’s the chance to sit, think and mentally explore; if I manage to grow a few tomatoes that will be a bonus.

I must cultivate 75% of my plot to retain the right to sit in my deckchair, and as the gentleman from the Council who came to measure my bed of potatoes and grow-bags of tomatoes can confirm, I cultivate 75%; the remainder is strictly for listening to the birds from the comfort of the deckchair.

However, I do actually enjoy growing things; I’m a complete amateur and if it wasn’t for Google Lens I wouldn’t know the names of most plants. I seem to attract slugs, I tried the eggshells and the plastic cups of beer, but that seemed to create a rave at which the remainder of the runner beans went down the mouths of drunk slugs.

I try, I feel the other plot holders saying, there goes the trier, the one with the aphids clinging onto the beans and the tomatoes with the yellow leaves. I’m in continual utter awe at a tiny seed springing into a little shoot and growing into a beautiful plant; even if that plant does finish up in a slugs belly.

I’ll post photos of my attempts at self-sufficiency, just so everyone is aware, I try, yes I fail frequently, but I then try again, and eventually my fingers may turn green.